January 24, 2004 – Big Mountain Freeride Bike Adventures has taken the traditional guided mountain bike trip, turned it upside down and put it into high gear.
“No tour company that existed out there really excited me,” says Chris Winter, founder of Big Mountain. “From my research, it was either: pull up your white cotton socks and join us on a double track meander using toe clips, or come stain your pants and huck yourself off a cliff with us.” There's no doubt that today's rider likes to go downhill and learn to ride stunts, but he or she also likes to climb, to get exercise and feel like they've accomplished something worthwhile. Plus, bike technology is advancing quickly the strong and light dual suspensions with disk brakes are built to excel on the whole mountain. I wanted to develop dream trips for today's style of riding using local guides and making sure that we stop to enjoy the view and experience the culture along the way.”
Winter hasn't just appeared out of nowhere on the mountain bike scene, he co-owned Joyride Productions, the company that developed and produced the first ever mountain bike Slopestyle event at the Whistler Summer Gravity Festival in July 2003 and the successful Joyride Bikercross series. Both events attracted the top World Cup and freeride athletes in the world. Deep down however, Winter has always loved to research routes, guide trips and travel with his bike. Its no wonder, his parents started operating European cycle touring trips in 1972. Today, 32 years later, Cycleventures Bicycle Tours offers routes all over Europe and boasts a devout following of cyclists. For Winter, having spent most of his life involved in these trips, developing and guiding bike trips was in his blood.
Big Mountain's 2004 line-up of trips is to British Columbia and the Swiss Alps. At home in BC, two different trips are available. The 9-day Supernatural: a true freeride adventure that visits a myriad of different riding zones in South Western BC from the hallowed North Shore, to the Whistler Bike Park, to floatplane and helicopter assisted riding in the isolated wilderness of the Chilcotin Range. The Flying Beaver is a five day trip based in the Chilcotins. This trip also uses the floatplane and helicopter, but lots of pedal power along the way. One of the highlights of the Flying Beaver is when the group's gear gets flown up to a pristine alpine lake from where they spend two nights camping and riding in a completely remote environment.
In the Swiss Alps, Winter has teamed up with local Francois Panchard who has mapped and documented his country's epic trails with GPS, photographs and film.
In August of 2003, Winter and Panchard hosted 10 Canadian riders on a reconnaissance trip that included pro freeriders like Wade Simmons and Andrew Shandro, photographer Sterling Lorence and writer Mitchell Scott. Winter uses this group of strong riders to hone Big Mountain's trip logistics – making sure that the trails are suitable, the accommodation is comfortable and locations are chosen properly for future groups. “We had just finished the most epic descent you could imagine and 10 minutes later we're on another gondola, climbing up the next mountain. The trip was set up perfectly,” recalls Shandro. “Our group felt so fortunate to have ridden practically untouched trails. To top it off, the crew that we were with was unreal. We had a blast.” It seems that this formula is working well for Big Mountain. The result of the reconnaissance trip is a trip called Cloudraker, a 12-day lift accessed smorgasbord of all-mountain riding big climbs and around 75,000 feet of descending. To top it off, several nights during Cloudraker are spent in high alpine huts, sipping wine with grand views of the Alps.
2004 Trip details: Cloudraker, Switzerland. Land cost: $2850 CAD Dates: August 12-23 and August 25-September 5.
The Flying Beaver, B.C. Land cost: $1240 CAD Dates: August 2-6 and September 4-8
The Supernatural, B.C. Land cost: $2310 CAD Dates: July 15-23 and August 15-23
Web site: www.ridebig.com.